FNM - Mar 13, 2009

The Blightning deck did fairly well last week, so I used it again on this week's FNM.


Round 1: vs. BW Tokens (won)

My opponent's deck is one of the Tier 1 decks of the current Standard format, but for some reason, this is the first time that I had ever seen or played against this deck. Anyway, the first game ended in my favor, but did have an interesting thing happen towards the end. I had him quickly down to 1 life, with a Goblin Outlander on the board, but my opponent played an Ajani Goldmane and gained 2 life with the planeswalker's first ability. It took 5 full turns of -2/+2 life swings before I eventually drew an Incinerate to finish him off. Quite scary, considering a single card from him usually nets 3 to 4 creatures. In the second game, I lost very quickly because I got stuck at 2 lands. In the third game, I finished him quickly once again, courtesy of my unearth creatures.

Game standing: 2-1
Match standing: 1-0


Round 2: vs. Esper Control (won)

I'm happy each time I face a control deck, and this time was no different. The first game quickly finished in my favor with a combination of Hellspark Elementals and a lot of burn. The second game though was a bit more exciting when I had him at 2 life, but no creatures on the board and no cards in hand. I was in top deck mode for a few turns once again, until I eventually drew the Flame Javelin to finish him off. After the game, I asked my opponent why I never saw a Cryptic Command all match. He said that his CC's were used by a teammate in another deck, so he had no choice but to use Punish Ignorance -- which he DID use a couple of times, saving him from losing a few times as well.

Game standing: 4-1
Match standing: 2-0


Round 3: vs. Blightning Beatdown (lost)

When pairings were first announced, I was actually matched up with a player whom I knew was playing a 5-color control deck. I was happy about this, and in fact, had my Hellspark Elemental already attacking on turn 2, when the TO announced that we had to be repaired -- one player apparently had dropped from the tournament, but wasn't properly removed from the pairings. When the new pairings were announced, I got switched to a mirror match.

Despite having slightly different builds (my opponent had 5-drops in the form of Demigod of Revenge, while I had the more aggresive build of no 5-drops), this matchup is actually just a coin toss. In the first game, I had Mogg Fanatics against his 1/1 Figure of Destinies, and he had removal for most of my creatures, until he ran out of them and a pair of Boggart Ram-Gangs finished him off. In the second game, we went down the wire, with both of us at 5 life. No creatures were on the board, he had zero cards in hand, and I had 1 card -- Volcanic Fallout -- which I played at the end of his turn. We were both at 3 life then, and I slowly peeked at my draw. It was a land. I passed the turn, and he drew an Incinerate ftw. Game 3 was a reverse of our first game, with me playing control to his aggresive creatures, and when I finally ran out of gas, he finished me off with his creatures.

Game standing: 5-3
Match standing: 2-1


Round 4: vs. WW Kithkins (won)

I was up against the deck that I hated the most while I was playing the Elves deck -- WW Kithkins. Things didn't change as I quickly lost game 1, courtesy of an early Burrenton Forge-Tender, and an Ajani pumping his creatures. In game 2, I was able to make a super Figure of Destiny, and he had no answer against the 8/8 flying avatar. In game 3, he went greedy and kept a 1-land hand with 3 Burrenton Forge-Tenders, but ended up losing the match thanks to just a swarm of creatures on my end. Each BFT could only block one creature, luckily. :)

Final game standing: 7-4
Final match standing: 3-1


I apparently ended up with pretty good tiebreaks, because despite having a couple of other players at 3-1, I ended up in 4th place (3rd place to all the way down to 8th place were all at 3-1). Too bad I barely lost out on the Kitchen Finks FNM card (it was given to the top 3 finishers), but at least, I won two Conflux boosters this time. They both contained crappy rares, but at least I got these two uncommons:



That completes the set, so it's good enough for me. :)